Forward Momentum
by mysticxf
Summary: What makes Clara so different from the others? And who exactly is the Doctor? (Musings from both characters.)


It's a quiet moment aboard the Tardis, one of very few. He'd gotten so used to the Ponds – the _boisterous_ Ponds – and _chatty_ Donna and _laughing_ Martha and _inquisitive_ Rose and… he'd forgotten what it was like to listen to nothing more than the engine sounds of his ship. There were no livid outbursts, no animated conversations, no requests for an influx of loud music from back home, or stomping about in curious exploration.

It was simply silent.

So silent he'd forgotten there was a diminutive woman standing just above him on the Tardis console, leaned against it, fingers trailing over the workings of the machine in a passive survey of his alien abode. Until there was a small giggle at a noise that a knob made, all on its own, and it snapped him out of his daze as he sat in his swing, tinkering with the mechanics that sat open overtop him.

He wanted to ask her what she'd found, but when he pushed his goggles off his eyes and peered up through the scant and scattered holes in the new platform overhead, he found himself caught up in his thoughts about her. _Again_. Who was she? How had she come to be? Why did she keep popping up in his life? Had she been there other times and he hadn't noticed? And why? Why? _WHY_.

Clara _Oswin_ Oswald.

_How was she possible_?

The mind-boggling puzzle of a person who stood calmly, not asking a question or demanding his attention, just waiting patiently because he'd told her… he'd told her they could leave just as soon as he made a few repairs. A few repairs he'd started hours ago, and they'd be off to explore the stars again. Together. He could recall with ease the smile that made him involuntarily grin back before he'd dashed off to find his tools and set himself to work, but he supposed he expected her to follow. It's what they did.

She'd make some comment about her dad fixing his car to no avail or the Maitland's never leaving on time for a scheduled even either. Something to remind him she was there, waiting. But she hadn't, she'd remained patiently on the console, idle and cooperative. Different from any other person who had ever walked through the Tardis doors as his companion, or otherwise.

It was somewhat maddening.

He opened his mouth to call her name, but found no sound emerging because for the first time, he didn't want someone around watching him be clever and he didn't want someone around poking and pestering and getting them both into trouble. He wanted to remain entranced in the moment, watching her eyes flutter about the gadgets and gizmos in front of her, finger occasionally tapping at one or swiping at another, or simply gesturing, working it out.

Was she trying to figure out his Tardis?

Trying to learn how to fly it?

Learning how to sabotage it?

He shook the suggestions away with a flip of his hair, hair that dropped back down into his eye as he continued to watch her. Like some alien world herself, set in a distant time he'd never thought to go, waiting to be explored, but unlike all of his other companions – planets and moons and stars that demanded to be seen – Clara simply existed, quietly smirking at discoveries that drifted along. As though amused by them and their smallness. Settling the knuckle of the forefinger on her right hand against her bottom lip, she chuckled to herself again, almost inaudibly, and then she shifted forward again.

Gripping the straps that held his swing in place, he leaned slightly, trying to get a better look at her there, tilting his head to see through a new set of holes, and he could see the frown that overtook her face as she stepped on tip toe to see something just beneath the center of the console. A hand came up, delicately running over something just out of his vision and the corner of her mouth lifted into a quick and delightful grin.

What had she found? What curious thing had caught her attention just there that he couldn't recall? Why couldn't he recall it? The Doctor tried to see, but he couldn't and he realized how foolish this was. When had he watched from a distance? When had he remained in the shadows? Why had she made him so keen on secretive observation?

The dark arch of her eyebrow dropped as her hand slipped away and she was back down on the soles of her feet, attention wandering about the room and for a moment he held his breath, terrified that somehow she'd catch him peering up at her like a hunter stalking prey. She sighed silently and pushed off the console and he brightened – she'd come find him and she'd ask him what he was doing and she'd listen intently as he rattled off an explanation too confounding to understand and she'd make a joke. She always made jokes.

_Mocked_ his intelligence and _chided_ his arrogance.

Finding some way to bring him down a notch.

Except she did none of that. She strolled to the side and landed in a seat, hands folded in her lap with another long and quiet sigh. Baffled, he dropped back in his swing, occasionally glancing up at the silver metal above him in frustration. It occurred to him that he could simply join her, or he could ask her to join him, but the stubbornness swelling inside of him refused to allow it.

"You alright down there?" She finally called. "Engine hasn't sucked you in, _has it_, Doctor?"

And then there's the hint of a laugh that makes his mouth lift at the corners because he understands that she means he's _careless_ and that the notion that he'd be thick enough to get sucked in by an engine had crossed her mind in _amusement_. He swings silently, considering for a moment what she must think of him. He found her perplexing, a curiosity among curiosities content to remain undisturbed. Lingering on the edge of shadows, occasionally peeking out and on one occasion she found him peeking back inside.

Knocking on the door of her world in an odd outfit with an over-enthused smile and an eagerness he supposed, _in retrospect_, was off-putting. And she'd dismissed him as one might a door-to-door salesman. Except that he'd saved her and in return, he'd been rewarded with a piqued interest and hot tea he hadn't the good fortune to drink. And a shared intrigue in which sat their relationship.

Never questioning; always questioned.

"_Doctor_?"

He could hear the small steps coming over his head and he jerked, pulling the goggles back over his eyes in a rush that left him pained as he lifted a tool to jam into an open space next to him. Clara came down the steps gingerly, hand coming up to the beams at her sides before ducking underneath the console to find him in the swing, legs crossed and tucked in the space underneath as he tinkered. She eyed him quixotically because there'd been no noise for some time and she'd actually begun to think he might have fallen asleep.

She supposed he slept – everything slept some time. Even computers had sleep modes, she knew. _Now_. Arms folded over her chest, she reached a foot out to tap at his leg and when he looked to her, she fought the urge to smile at his boyish face covered in those enormous goggles. She fought it with the knowledge that he was over a thousand years old and he had no business looking so foolish, so she scowled at him instead, watching his lips drop until they flattened and he turned away, gesturing at the open panel.

"Almost finished," he lamented.

Clara nodded, "Did you know there's a button, just under the center, labeled Bubbles."

His eyes widened as he asked brightly, "Did you push it?"

With a laugh, she shook her head, "I believe I've pushed enough of _her_ buttons."

He frowned. They'd never get along if they didn't try. She stretched towards him suddenly, pulling the goggles off his head, staring at them in her hands before sighing at the silliness of them. The Doctor was thankful that at least she hasn't _shot_ them off and he stood, gesturing at the seat until she'd looked between him and the swing enough times to make him laugh.

"Sit," he finally offered.

There was a small fluster of panic in her eyes, but she hid it away and turned, dropping down into the chair with a sound of surprise when her feet left the ground as she sank into it. He caught the straps at each side and held her steady and they shared a nervous giggle before he nodded at the goggles.

"What, put them on?" She questioned.

"Safety first," he allowed, watching as she narrowed her eyes at him a moment before she flipped them on over her head and he quickly reached for them, tightening them so they wouldn't simply flop down to her neck. With a smile, he shifted away and looked at the large eyes peering up at him and her chipmunk cheeks that only seemed larger with the headgear on.

"What are we fixing?" She asked.

He pointed up at the wiring and began to tell her, watching the way she furrowed her brow, trying to understand, before he gave her knees a small push and moved back. Her hands came up to grab at the straps at either side and she seemed genuinely surprised, but then smiled as he continued to meet his palms to her knees.

"Use to love the swings," she told him, leaning her head back slightly to watch the underside of the console zoom in and out of her field of vision through the odd goggles resting on her face. "Mum would take me sometimes after school."

He gave a humph of laughter and looked to the ground sadly and she came to a slow stop, looking him over as he was lost in some thought she was afraid to ask about. Was he thinking about his own childhood? So very long ago so very far away? Was he thinking about his mum? He must have a mum somewhere – or had at some time. Did they have swings on Gallifrey? How long had he been a child if he could be a young man a thousand years on?

Sometimes she wondered how many questions she could have about him and his life. He was a mysterious creature who'd shown up at her doorstep with her name, eager on his lips – as though he'd found something so very dear to him that he'd lost and been looking for. And everything about him both terrified and delighted her in ways she couldn't describe. Clara let her legs dangle underneath her as she watched him, knowing she'd get very little chance to observe him this way.

Lost in thought.

_So very still_.

Because normally he was absolutely kinetic; a frantic mess of thoughts and words and movements that made her dizzy and excited and confused. And very much like she needed to take hold of something to not be blown off course by the exhilaration of being in his presence. But now he was on his knees just a few feet away, mind wandering off to a place that even the Tardis couldn't travel – or at least she thought it couldn't. It wouldn't be the first time she'd wondered about the machine they were sitting in. About what it could do, or, more specifically, what it could do to the persons inside.

Clara considered what could take him to that place, where he was so lost in his mind that he blocked out the world around him. She'd watched him stare down a god the size of a planet and then offer her a bite to eat before they left for home and she'd listened to him talk of such outstanding things she wasn't sure she had the imagination to truly picture as though they were common occurrences – and Clara believed they were. With things so grandiose, what could stop his forward momentum so rapidly?

The thought of a set of swings on a playground?

The simplicity of a mum and her daughter?

_What had she said_?

Leaning back, she looked over the wiring he'd been working on, the array of colored strips and blinking lights that fluttered about like blood through veins over muscles around bones. It was a living thing, a living thing that didn't like her despite the small friendly whispers she allowed when his back was turned or the gentle pets she gave it when she entered. Clara blinked away the thoughts and found herself staring into his eyes, staring back into hers.

"Sorry," she allowed.

He gave a shake of his head, "There's no need to apologize."

Pulling the goggles off her head, she moved to stand, but found it impossible and she laughed as he stood to tug her out and he held her steady while she regained her balance. "I should come back when you're finished," she gestured at the open panel before watching his face fall. "I don't want to be in the way."

"Clara," he laughed, her name said in that way that somehow only he had that carried a whole myriad of explanation in two such simple syllables.

She smiled, awkwardly, and made her way up to the console and then to the front doors, but the engines revved up suddenly and she found herself gripping the railing of the ramp and turning to see him at the controls, giving her an aloof grin she instantly mimicked. Making her way towards him, she watched as he twisted and turned the devices in front of him with such ease and she reached out to bop a button when he pointed. The Tardis whirred and whistled and soon they were adrift in space, floating amongst the stars – she could feel it.

"Why have we stopped?" Clara asked him curiously.

He moved to the doors and waited, watching as she approached with the goggles still gripped in her fingers, and then he pushed them open, looking out into space as she stood back, "It's ok, it's safe," he told her with a nod and an outstretched hand. Clara took it, allowing him to guide her to him where he dropped an arm over her shoulder, giving it a squeeze.

"Is this where you go when you're so lost in thought?" She asked him in barely a whisper, watching the stardust floating by and the twinkling of the universe around them.

He smiled, "No, it's where I go to regain a lost thought."

Clara nodded, "Not quite a secluded space, but I guess it'll do."

"What was that?" He questioned.

She shrugged and glanced up at him, "When I was a kid, I used to lose things a lot. Mum would tell me to go to a quiet spot, cull the thoughts together and remember where I'd misplaced it." She could see the amusement on his face and she gave him a small bump of her elbow resting at his side, "Usually worked."

"Yes, I'll keep it in mind – in case I've lost _my_ mojo one day."

Giving his nod of recognition a curious stare, she asked, "What have you lost this time?"

"Not what I've lost," he told her, glancing out. "It's what I've found." And when she realized he meant her, she blushed and turned away. "And it needs to be said – all of time and space, all of it and I'll never be finished." Then he adds with another soft press of his fingers into her flesh, "And you'll _never_ be in the way."

They watch the stars, listening to the silence of space while stealing glances at each other, both knowing the other is doing the same. The Doctor pushed aside the questions plaguing his mind because he knew they'd be there the next day, and the next, and he isn't quite sure he'll ever find the answers. Clara chose to do the same, satisfied for the time that she's the one he's chosen to share this experience and they drift forward in time, both lost in thought about the one at their side.

End


End file.
